Title : Chinese Cinderella --- A Secret Story of An Unwanted Daughter
Author : Adeline Yen Mah
Publisher: Puffin Books
Pages : 234
ISBN : 0-141-30487-1
My review:
I've just read this book entitled Chinese Cinderella --- A Secret Story of An Unwanted Daughter. It's so touching and I cried for the poor little girl, Yan Jun-ling, who was deprived of love from her family since born. Her mother passed away after 3 weeks giving birth to her, and because of this, she was considered unlucky. Her father remarried after a year her mother left and this half-French, half-Chinese woman became her stepmother. This woman, her stepmother, whom she called niang, was worse than that of Cinderella's. Not only she mistreated Jun-ling, she also abused her stepdaughter emotionally and physically, by restricting her every move and always slapping her. Her father, who never cared for her, just stood still, watching the whole 'drama' going on, without any intentions of stopping his new-wife. She suffered throughout her whole childhood and the only ones who cared for her were her grandfather, ye-ye, and her aunt Baba. She was determined to change her fate and she managed to do this by studying as hard as she could so that she can get the nod from her father to her continue her studies abroad.
This is a wonderful memoir of Adeline Yen Mah's, which possesses the power to touch your soul, now and forever.
My rating : 10/10
Words from Adeline Yen Mah :
Chinese Cinderella is dedicated to you with the fervent wish that you will persist in trying to do your best in the face of hopelessness; to have faith that in the end your spirit will prevail; to transcend your traumas and transform them into a source of courage, creativity and compassion.
Mother Teresa once said that 'loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted are the greatest poverty'. To this I will add : ' Please believe that one single positive dream is more important than a thousand negative realities'.
Read this book, or you'll regret your whole life!
